Khao Hom Mali Thung Kula Rong Hai (Thung Kula Rong Hai Jasmine Rice)

Thung Kula Rong Hai, the plain of the Kula people who wept in the heat, lies in the lowlands of Isan, the Khorat plateau of north-eastern Thailand. It is registered under the Thai geographical indication system as Khao Hom Mali Thung Kula Rong Hai, and the name belongs to fragrant rice grown within that delimited area and no other. The registration protects the place as much as the grain: jasmine rice is a Thai variety, but this plain gives it a distinct standing.

Khao hom mali, literally jasmine-scented rice, is the grain on which the Thai table is built, and Leela Punyaratabandhu treats it in Bangkok as the quiet centre of the meal, the plain element against which every curry, relish and stir-fry is measured. The rice is long-grained and, when cooked, soft, slightly clinging and perfumed, a quality that comes from the aromatic compounds in the grain itself and that is strongest in newly harvested rice. A cook who understands this understands why the rice is never an afterthought: the dishes are seasoned boldly precisely because the rice receives them. The Thung Kula Rong Hai plain sits on the Khorat plateau, a country of lower rainfall and harder conditions than the watered rice lands of the central plain and the Chao Phraya delta. The paddies here depend on the monsoon, and the crop is planted and harvested once in the year, the grain ripening in the cooler, drier weeks at the close of the rains. That single, rain-fed cycle is part of what the registration describes, and it separates this rice from the irrigated crops of the central plain that can be grown more than once in a season. The geographical indication is the legal expression of this connection between grain and ground. The name Khao Hom Mali Thung Kula Rong Hai may be used only for rice of the recognised variety grown in the defined districts, and so the phrase on the sack carries a claim about origin that a buyer can rely upon. For the cook, the practical consequence is a more precise purchase: the plain name jasmine rice describes a type, whereas the protected name describes a type from a particular place. In the kitchen the treatment is simple and exacting. The rice is rinsed until the water runs nearly clear, cooked with a measured quantity of water, and left covered to rest so that the grains finish evenly. It is served in an unadorned mound, to be eaten with a spoon and fork in the Thai manner, and it is the standard against which the rest of the table is balanced. Where the rice is poor, the whole meal suffers, for the sharp, salty and hot dishes of the table have nothing soft and fragrant to lean upon.

Well-cooked Thung Kula Rong Hai rice is soft, faintly sweet and clearly perfumed, with a scent often compared to pandan and warm grain. At the table it stands against the heat of curries, the salt of fish sauce and the sourness of relishes, and it is the neutral, fragrant ground that lets those flavours be tasted in turn.